MONSTER MAYHEM

Hello and welcome to another edition of Philm Phreaks This time around I’m turning my evil eye toward a double Blu-ray set from Filmmasters called “The Monster Mayhem” collection. 

This set includes four black and white 1950s films. The first movie is called “Frankenstein’s Daughter,” and it was released in 1958. The movie focuses heavily on a young lady who lives with her scientist uncle and his research assistant. The assistant has some secrets that wind up impacting everyone in the film, though. 

It’s a good film with some creepy stuff and some surprises. It does feature a couple pop song performances from the time period. I don’t think those were necessary or hold up well, but that was a pretty common thing in b-movies at the time. 

The presence of teenaged characters allows them to bring those songs in, but also tie into another trend that was common at the time, centering a healthy portion of a film’s story on a group of teenagers. It was a trope that worked well most of the time, and I think it does a decent job of serving this film. (B-movies from this period were all about getting carloads of kids to the drive-in.--Historian Mality)

As a B-movie, this one is fairly effective. The monster costume isn’t the best, but it also isn’t the worst I’ve seen. They definitely tried and went with a somewhat unique look. 

Next up is 1957’s “Giant from the Unknown.” The idea here is that an infamous giant from a legend was not only real, but has returned to life. This one is fun, and it has some cool scenery. It’s not as good as “Frankenstein’s Daughter,” though. 

There is also something that I was literally laughing at in the movie. When you see the size of the giant’s armor and him, he really looks like a genuine giant. That is until you see him carrying the leading lady of the film. Then he just looks like a normal-sized guy. 

I get the whole concept of not quite pulling off something you attempt. In fact, I get that one-hundred percent. It’s just so glaring, though, that it’s the kind of thing people make fun of when watching old movies. Still, I really did enjoy this one quite a bit. The characters seem fairly well developed, and the idea behind the film is creative and unique. 

Moving to disc two, the first film is “Monster from Green Hell,” which was also from 1957. Of the four movies here, it’s the weakest of the bunch. The idea behind it, a species of giant wasp is great, though. The 1950s practical effects, while cheesy, have a lot of charm and were creative. I even love the way they explained the origin of the monsters. 

Where the movie breaks down is pacing. There is far too much safari-type footage and dealing with the natives and not nearly enough monster stuff. 

I think that perhaps some might have trouble with some of the depictions of the native Africans, but I was actually a little surprised for a film of its era. I mean, some of the leaders of the Africans are among the smartest and most level-headed of the bunch. That was rare for films of the time. Don’t get me wrong, this is no “Wakanda Forever,” but in comparison to a lot of other movies from the time, that was refreshing to me. 

The movie has a lot of promise and comes close to delivering on it. Ultimately, though, too much of the movie is boring. I’d actually love to see someone remake this film, as long as they didn’t use AI to pull it off. 

The final feature of the bunch is also the one I liked the best. That’s the “Brain from Planet Arous.” The movie is also from 1957. The star of the film is John Agar, who really is in a lot of old genre films. He sort of plays a double role here, but I’m not going to spoil it, even though this movie is almost 70 years old. I think this might be one of his best performances. That makes it a shame that this movie has sort of been forgotten over the years. 

After getting weird radiation readings coming from an area of the desert, Agar’s character, along with his partner, go on an expedition to find what’s causing it. Agar’s character comes back, but he’s acting weird and claims his friend has gone to Las Vegas. 

Again, without giving too much away, this movie really works well in dealing with an alien threat. The effects, while cheesy by modern standards, are pretty cool. The only complaint I have is that I wish they had tacked a few more minutes in at the end to resolve some questions I was left with. All in all, though, this one of the better 1950s sci-fi monster films. 

In terms of bonus materials, there are quite a few interesting things here – mostly in terms of featurettes. None of them grabbed me enough to sit through them at the time, but I bet I’ll watch them later. They have the potential to be fascinating. I just wasn’t in the right mindset. All in all, I highly recommend this set. It delivers four largely forgotten films that all manage to entertain to varying degrees.